


You Come Back to What You Need

by angelic_tourniquet



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe in that it is canon compliant until 5x10 and then it isn't, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Memory Alteration, in which Kara and Lena try to deal with feelings, some mention of Lex, sort of a fix it fic but idk, this whole memory reinstatement thing got me like
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-04-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:08:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23105284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelic_tourniquet/pseuds/angelic_tourniquet
Summary: Resetting the Universe is never as straight-forward as it seems. So while Kara is getting used to the way things are now on Earth-Prime, she still can't let go of Lena. But there's something else that's holding onto Lena too. Kara may not have gotten a clean slate, but some things are worth fighting for.
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Comments: 5
Kudos: 62





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There are certain aspects of the whole J'onn J'onnz reconfiguring memories thing that really bothered me after Crisis. So I started playing around with this idea. When I came up with this idea, I actually thought "This will just be a little ficlet". And then I thought, "Actually, it's not really worth writing, but it's fun and also frustrating to think about!" And then it wouldn't leave me the hell alone so I started writing it. And then it grew... so here we are.  
> Also the title is a line from Taylor Swift's "This Love". Funnily enough, the song had only shuffled on after I had finished writing part 1.  
> Lastly, I have not watched beyond 5x11... (and in all likelihood do not plan to).

Lena tightens her grip on the crystal tumbler in her hand and waits for the jolt of pain to subside. These headaches are becoming a nuisance, and the images they leave behind an even greater source of frustration. She massages her temples and corrects herself – it’s not just frustration she feels. As the headache recedes into a dull throb behind her eyes, she combs through the memory fragments that are now nestled in her mind. Her hand mimics the memory that has just burst through, gathering up the folds of an imaginary cardigan into a fist. Registering a distinct difference in the texture and weight of the fabric in her hand now is enough to reconnect her to the present. She tips the remains of the rich, oaky scotch into her mouth and rests the tumbler on the ledge of her balcony.

Drinking does nothing to stem these concussive memory episodes. She had coined this term on its first occurrence three weeks ago, riding the elevator down to the lobby after visiting her mother at the Luthor Foundation. _…Try to only be partners this time._ The phrase had looped in her mind like a corrupted audio file until Lena had felt her legs give out. She had regained consciousness, squinting into the fluorescent lights above her, the quaint ding of the elevator announcing its arrival at the ground level.

The episodes have only gotten worse since then. Lena has run every diagnostic scan and digital imaging analysis she can think of to try and understand what is happening to her. All of the tests show only her usual, healthy, and by all accounts, impressive brain. There are no lesions, no tumors, and no clots. What she does have, however, are splitting headaches and small fragments of another life. They don’t make sense to her at first, these snippets of disjointed memories. There’s a house, a piano, the smell of rain and plumeria. Over time they become sharper – writing in her journal in the glow of a fireplace, microwaving popcorn for movie night, the brush of a cashmere blanket against the small of her back. Each episode is like a stripping back of wallpaper, revealing an elegant original surface. And what becomes clearer is that there is someone else in these memories. This had been a life shared.

When she questions Lex, she does so cautiously, unwilling to trust him with the delicate mosaic she has pieced together. He dismisses her questions about the version of their lives in this rebooted world, urging her instead to keep focused on the tasks at hand. “Eyes on the prize, sis,” he says, waving his index finger in the air as he glides out of the room for another scheduled media event. It isn’t like him to feign ignorance, or miss an opportunity to illustrate her foolishness point-blank, and so she concludes that Lex doesn’t know about the life she had had before her old memories had been restored. Ordinarily, she’d relish knowing something he did not, but she can’t shake the feeling that his dismissal of it in some way indicates that these memories are in fact meaningless. 

The sky is now the deep indigo of an undisturbed night and Lena wonders why she doesn’t have outdoor furniture on her balcony. The muscles in her calves begin to pull in defiance of the heels she is still wearing, even though her work day has been over for hours. It is calm in National City, and from the pristine tower she lives in, the view is ordinary. It strikes her as an odd thought at first. This building is the tallest in the city, boasting the most breathtaking views from the harbour to the mountains. But she gets the feeling that she has seen a view far more exquisite. The memory rushes in like a wave. It is wisps of cloud against a backdrop of inky, navy-blue sky, stars, scattered about unapologetically, gleam like polished gems. And Lena is weightless and laughing with unrivalled mirth. Kara has one arm wrapped around Lena’s waist, while the other holds Lena’s hand in perfect replication of the waltz frame. And they are dancing, suspended in mid-air, as Kara gently completes revolution upon revolution while drinking in Lena’s joy softened features. 

It’s the look that does it – the way Kara’s blue eyes hold all the love in the world just for Lena. And it’s this recognition that sends her tumbling back into her body, where she is gripping the ledge of the balcony and gritting her teeth as this episode scrambles the circuits of her brain like an electric beater. Lena cries out, knocking the empty tumbler to the ground where it shatters musically at her feet. And still the pain does not subside, and as she doubles over, Lena thinks that maybe this is the memory that will kill her. 

There’s a whoosh, followed by the distinctive sound of boots hitting the ground as Kara rushes to Lena’s side. “Lena?”  
Lena thinks it wondrous how many emotions she can knit into just two syllables. Then there’s a hand on her shoulder as Kara tries to assess where and how she is hurt. But it’s not Kara, it’s Supergirl. The blue suit hugs Kara’s body like a second skin, confronting Lena with the perpetual separation she had not known existed between them until recently. Lena is caught between fighting for breath and fighting the urge to push against the red crest in the centre of Supergirl’s chest. But when her palm flattens against the fabric of the suit, Lena feels the tension in her own chest abate by a fraction.   
“Lena, I’m here. It’s okay.” Kara’s voice is a soothing balm. “Just breathe, slowly, with me.”  
Supergirl covers the hand Lena has on her chest with her own and takes a long, slow breath in, encouraging her to do the same with piercing blue eyes. And Lena breathes in, feeling the strong, steady heartbeat beneath her hand. She hates how easy it is. How the panic and pain retreats like the swish of a red cape.  
_In a moment of weakness you’ll let your guard down…_ Lillian’s words rear in her mind like a scorpion’s stinger. It feels inevitable, Lena giving in to her emotions and being met only with betrayal, hurt, and disappointment. It is her curse to crave love. She wants to laugh hysterically, because while she begs not to be made a fool, she continues to play one, willingly it seems. The soft pad of a thumb caresses the skin beneath her eye and she realizes that Kara is wiping away the tears freefalling down her face.  
“Kara…” It’s a broken sound that erupts from Lena's lips and she wants desperately to not be facing this longing and this hope. The Girl of Steel is impossibly close now, the sound of her name drawing their bodies together.  
“I’ve got you,” whispers Kara. “Just tell me what you need, please, Lena.” Her lips move against the top of Lena’s head in reverence and it’s an intimacy Lena never thought she’d experience again. She is so tired. Tired of fighting, tired of wearing her strategic pieces of armour, and tired of the isolation.  
“Here, just–” she shoves her phone into Kara’s chest, pressing it against the red crest that mocks her still, “– take me here.” Kara scrutinizes the map on the screen and nods.  
“Are you sure you don’t want to grab a jacket?” she asks. Lena shakes off the natural gesture that highlights Kara’s tender concern for her.  
“No,” she replies. “Just fly. Fast.”  
They’re in the air immediately, Kara cradling Lena in her arms, a solid wall of muscle forming a protective barrier around her.

\-----

Kara revels in the feeling of Lena’s arms around her neck, easily supporting her weight with one arm as she cleaves the air with the other. The scent of Lena’s perfume along her neckline is both familiar and intoxicating, so she focuses instead on the steady rhythm of Lena’s heartbeat. It tells her that Lena is safe, and it grounds her like so many other times before. She manages an even speed, but even so, it doesn’t take her long to reach the destination pinpointed on Lena’s phone. She knows they will need to disengage eventually, but Kara is not ready to be sent away. They appear to be in the middle of nowhere and all she can see for miles in every direction is dense forest. She is about to ask Lena if they’re in the right place when a shimmer of light breaks across them and the forest disappears, revealing what looks to be a two-storey house. The technology is similar to what had been used to shroud Lex’s old manor, so she knows that this must be the place.

Kara descends gracefully, the soles of her boots touching down on the stone balcony, and the house awakens in recognition of her. The glass door slides open and, wordlessly, Lena slips out of Kara’s arms and into the house, kicking off her heels as she enters. Kara feels suddenly naked, standing awkwardly on the outside while her cape flaps gently in the breeze. From somewhere in the house, she can hear the rustle of clothes as drawers are opened and then closed. She hears a contented sigh from Lena, and pictures her shoulders dropping into a relaxed position, the tension fading from her brow, the sudden release of pent up energy palpable even from the outside looking in. When Lena reappears, she is tugging the sides of an oversized, fawn-coloured cardigan across her body, her delicate feet sink into the plush carpet as she pads into the room, and her thick hair hangs in dark swathes down her shoulders and back. It is breathtaking the way that Lena damages Kara’s composure. Her breath hitches and she has to plant her feet a little firmer to resist the urge to speed towards her. She tucks her fingers into her palms, tightening her fists as she watches Lena dip her head and close her eyes.

This individual mental preparation happens instinctively, and they’re both surprised when Lena finally says, “You can come inside… if you want to.” It’s not Lena’s boardroom voice, nor the clinical detached tone of her lab voice. It isn’t dishing at brunch, or the quiet deflation usually reserved for berating herself for having made some grievous, life altering error in calculation. There’s a quiet vulnerability in the way Lena swallows before saying, ‘if’. It’s raw and disarming, and Kara knows that this unveiling comes at considerable cost to Lena. She does not take it for granted. And so, instead of answering optimistically, she uncurls her fists and crosses the threshold. She’s met by an invisible field that rings with a hollow thud when her body makes contact with it. A small drawer slides out from the wall to her right with a quiet hiss and Lena takes a tentative step forward. “I don’t think you can wear that in here,” Lena says, motioning her head down the length of Kara’s body, indicating her Super-suit.  
“Oh,” is all Kara can manage.  
She casts a sideways glance at the drawer and makes her decision. She trusts that Lena will explain everything once the barrier is down. It takes only seconds for the suit to dematerialize back into the motion-activated sensor on her glasses. She removes them gently from her face, places them inside the expectant drawer and watches it disappear into the wall. She reaches out to test the invisible wall, hoping the house approves of teal slacks and a white button down shirt. Smiling when she meets no further resistance, she closes the gap between herself and Lena. Something in Lena’s eyes stops Kara short of pulling the shorter woman into a hug. Not quite a warning, but not an invitation either. Kara lifts a hand to stroke her arm instead, bartering for closeness. Lena’s rebuff is instant, and Kara feels the blow like a punch to the gut. She knows the rejection is deserved, and so she absorbs it, because Lena is still worth fighting for. She gives Lena a small, apologetic smile and asks the first of her multitudinous questions. “Are you okay?”

It seems as good a place as any to start, but seeing Lena’s lips twitch into a bitter smile makes Kara wince. “Considering everything I’ve been through since moving to National City, I suppose I should consider this par for the course,” says Lena. Her voice has that low, honeyed tone it gets when she’s exhausted. Her voice trails down the stairs as she disappears deeper inside the house, still talking. “But if you’re asking about what happened to me on the balcony? Yes, I’m fine now. The episode has passed.”  
Kara makes her way down the stairs, distracted by the inexplicable pictures lining the walls, but more worried about the ominous allusion in Lena’s explanation. She stops at the base of the stairs and throws her hands up haltingly as her eyes squeeze shut. “What do you mean, ‘episode’?”  
She watches Lena pull the stopper free of a scotch decanter and pour two fingers’ worth into a glass. Lena then carries the glass, along with the decanter, to the sectional couch that sits in front of a large fireplace and settles herself in one of the corners. With one leg folded beneath her the cardigan envelopes most of her body and Kara softens at the sight of Lena looking so uncharacteristically small. She’s determined to not make a mess of this opportunity to connect with Lena, as strained as it is between them, there is still hope. Making her way towards the couch, she considers sitting down but thinks better of it.

“Lena, I know that I am the last person you want to talk to, let alone confide in, about what is going on with you. But I’m still here. And I want to help you.”  
Lena raises an eyebrow as she locks stormy green eyes with Kara.  
“Do you? Or do you just want answers?”

Kara raises a hand to fiddle with her glasses, realizing too late that her disguise is now as unnecessary as it is incomplete. It’s a tiny gesture, and would usually be inconsequential, but it acts as a signal flare for Lena. “Not so accustomed to being the one left in the dark, are you, Supergirl?” Lena paints venom and spit around the title.  
“Lena, I can’t help who I am –” Kara begins.  
“But you could have shared who you are with me!” Lena interrupts. “All of you… Like I did with you!”  
Kara can hear the crack in her voice, the way Lena’s throat closes up as her eyes swim with tears. It hurts her that she hurt Lena. It’s unbearable.   
“I’m so sor–“  
“Please, Kara. No more apologies,” Lena begs. “It doesn’t help. Don’t you understand?” Lena’s porcelain skin shines from the tears sliding down her cheeks. “We could’ve had this,” she says, gesturing around the room.  
“No, I don’t understand,” Kara says. “What is all of this?”  
“This is yet another thing that Lex has taken away from me,” says Lena. “And ironically, he doesn’t even know that he did, though I’m sure it would delight him.”  
Kara stiffens at the mention of Lena’s brother and hot, angry energy pulses momentarily behind her eyes. She is still getting used to this post-Crisis world, and there are many details she finds hard to swallow; chief among them that Lex Luthor is not only alive and well, but is a Nobel Peace Prize-winning, world saving, household name. If she is having trouble processing, she can only imagine what Lena must be feeling.   
“Lex,” says Kara. “How are you coping with him… being alive?” Her voice is brittle, threatening to fracture with the fear that exploring this wound will inflict more harm. But Kara knows that bullets need to be removed before the healing can begin. And there is more than one bullet.

It takes a few moments for Lena to answer. Kara watches her arrange the thoughts in her mind, observes the micro-expressions passing over her features. The mask Lena has worn for weeks is faltering, exposing the feelings she has worked so hard to hide. Kara knows she has never hurt anyone the way she has hurt Lena. She has also never experienced hurt like this before. Sending Mon-El away did not feel like this. The only thing that approaches comparison is losing Argo. She and Lena are two feet apart in this room but it still feels as though Kara has lost an entire world. Fighting back tears of her own, she turns away from her study of Lena, and gazes around the room.  
Her eyes land on a framed photograph of Lena pulling a large brimmed sunhat down over the sides of her face, the laughter and happiness almost audible from her smile alone. In the photo the sky is an incandescent array of lavender, pink, and peach, and white cresting waves peek out of one corner. Her eyes carry over to the adjacent photo frame, following the same hues of the sunset, and landing on her own face. It’s clear that she is holding the camera to capture the moment Lena presses her lips to her own. In the photo it’s clear, it’s so, so clear…

“You’re the first person to ask me that,” Lena confesses. The sentence yanks Kara back into their conversation, leaving her head reeling. She wants to speed around the room and pick up every photograph before bombarding Lena with all of her questions, demanding answers. But there is more than one bullet, and she needs to be here for Lena, and with Lena. There is no further follow up as Lena fidgets with her glass.  
“I should’ve asked you sooner,” says Kara. Lena’s eyebrow quirks at the admission, but her mouth remains a downward crescent. Kara wrings her hands, pulling together the words she wants to say without using an apology as a crutch. “When I came to see you, that first time after we’d gotten our world back, I should’ve done so as someone who cared about you.” She shakes her head, “Cares,” she emphasises, but the word feels flimsy against the emotion she has been carrying around in her chest since the moment Lena had walked into the game night following the events at Shelley Island. “Instead, I put on the suit. And I thought it would…”  
“Protect me?” Lena scoffs.  
“No,” Kara says. “I thought it would protect me, from the truth of what I had done to you.” Kara moves closer to Lena, leaning into the hurt with her words as well as her body.  
“I wish you knew how many times I wanted to tell you the truth. How many times I almost did, almost blurted it out because I knew you deserved better. But then I’d think about all the times you’d been in danger… from Lex, from your mother, from threats both of this world and beyond. And that was without you even knowing that I was Supergirl. And all I could think, Lena, was how much _worse_ it would be if you knew.”  
Kara’s heart thumps wildly in her chest. It feels like there’s kryptonite in the air, but the only green she can see are Lena’s eyes, looking right at her.  
“Everyone who knows my secret gets sucked into this vortex of danger because I am the epicentre,” she continues.  
“And yet every time the DEO needed my help, or the world needed saving, you came to me,” says Lena. “That also makes me a target.” The corner of her mouth pulls up slightly in a twisted, sardonic smile. “More accurately, I have always been a target. So did you simply think that I was too weak to know the truth?”  
“No, no of course not,” says Kara. She struggles to find purchase on an explanation she herself has yet to fully grasp. And now, when it matters most, her words fail her. She feels Lena pulling away again. “You are a force to be reckoned with. You’re formidable in your own right. You are good, and brave, and so intelligent.” Kara takes a risk reaching out to gently lift Lena’s chin so that they are once again looking into each other’s eyes. “I may be the Girl of Steel, but you, Lena, are made of light. Light that grows stronger in spite of the darkness.”  
Lena moves her head and brushes Kara’s wrist away with the back of her hand.  
“You’re lying,” she whispers. “You kept me in the dark,” but there’s no conviction in it anymore.  
Something Lena had said in the Fortress creates a fissure of guilt in Kara’s chest. _And you chipped away at my armour with your warmth and your earnestness…_ And now Kara understands Lena’s pain, she finally understands what she needs to say. She takes Lena’s hand and presses it against her chest, over her heart. There’s no suit of armour for either of them now.  
“In the Fortress you told me that you wanted me to feel what you felt. Now, I wish that you could feel what I feel right now, for you.”  
Lena can’t muffle the sob that chokes her as she asks, “Why?”  
The sound is like a blade that glides right into Kara’s heart and twists.  
“Because…” says Kara, unable to stem her tears any longer. “Because, I love you!” 


	2. Chapter 2

It’s like a Roman candle explodes inside the room when Kara says those three words. As soon as she does, the memories hit Lena like a sonic boom. Then all she’s aware of is white fuzzy lights and the cadence of Kara’s voice from somewhere far away. It sounds like she’s saying, “Stay with me…” but when Lena tries to turn towards her voice her movements are impeded, as though she is underwater. She feels heavy and distant, and again, she’s so tired. The delicate scent of plumeria and rain appears right before she succumbs to her gossamer surroundings. 

Lena opens her eyes slowly, allowing the dimly lit room to reveal itself in small circles of focus. Her head pounds mercilessly. She’s laying on her side with one of the decorative cushions from the couch tucked under her head. She guesses she’s had at least one seizure and makes a mental note to update the medical log she’s been using to capture and record the details of the episodes and their effects. It’s not until she tries to prop herself onto her elbow that she registers the arm protectively curled around her midsection. The slight movement jerks Kara’s head from its position next to Lena’s. Relief sweeps over Kara’s face like an avalanche and Lena can’t help but give the smallest smile before a wave of nausea overcomes her. She panics, tries to stand up without throwing up at the same time as the word, “Sick,” escapes from her mouth. Kara has her settled in the bathroom, holding her hair back and rubbing small circles on her lower back before Lena even has time to worry about how mortifying this scenario is. But she’s grateful for two things as she sits on the cool tile of the bathroom floor. The first being that she’s only dry-heaving, which makes a difference, because the second thing is that Kara is here with her. Kara, who loves her.

Lena focuses on that thought as she pulls the toilet lid down and reaches up to flush. She doubts it’s the reaction Kara had expected, but so much has happened today that feels completely out of Lena’s control too. She wants to address all the events but first she needs to get a decent handle on herself. She leans her back against Kara and allows herself a few seconds to just feel her there before clearing her throat and testing her voice. “Sorry,” she says.   
Kara brushes the apology away like she brushes her hand down her arm. It’s comforting, and Lena takes a deep breath in, her body relaxing into the touch.   
“What can I do?” asks Kara.   
“I could use a shower,” Lena admits.   
Kara nods, “Of course.”   
When she gets to her feet Lena grabs her hand and asks, “Will you stay?” There’s a beat where she registers the question and qualifies it. “In the house, I mean, so we can talk?”  
She feels a gentle squeeze of affirmation in response, followed by an, “I’m not going anywhere,” before Kara leaves the bathroom, shutting the door behind her.

Looking at her face in the mirror as she finishes applying her moisturizer, Lena feels as though she has aged twenty-four years. It’s strange to see the furnishings around her and recognize their familiarity as moments of her new-found history.   
She finds Kara sitting on the sectional couch with an array of photo frames on the coffee table in front of her, and one clutched in her hand. She’s worrying her lower lip between her teeth, but looks up when Lena enters the room. Lena smooths the front of her jeans before taking a seat beside Kara on the couch, turning her knees towards her so that they’re almost touching Kara’s leg. She takes the photograph from Kara’s hand and smiles. “That’s my favourite too,” she says. “Six months ago you whisked us away to,” she pauses, then shakes her head. “You know, you never did tell me exactly where we were, and it never mattered when it came to us, because as long as we were together we were safe. Happy.” She looks up from the photo to take in Kara’s face. “Do you remember this?” she asks. It’s hard to keep the scientist out of her voice, even though she needs it to dampen the hope.   
“I don’t,” says Kara. And the small smile that tugs on the corner of her mouth is sad. “Lena, what is all this? What does this have to do with Lex?”

It’s challenging to put it into words but Lena tries. She explains to Kara that it was Lex who’d ensured her memories from before Crisis would remain intact when the world was restored. That he had bargained with the Monitor for her survival in exchange for his help.   
“Help,” scoffs Kara. “He hijacked Paragon status so he wouldn’t be wiped out of existence.” She’s thoughtful for a moment. “So, just like me, he doesn’t remember what this world was like before we came back,” says Kara.   
Lena nods, appreciating how quickly, yet patiently, Kara is taking all of this in. She feels a bubble of deep admiration rise through her body, followed by the urge to kiss her. Shifting in her seat, she folds her arms across her chest, curling her fingers around the curve of her bicep.   
“What remains to be seen is…” Lena gazes down at the photos of their time together. Neither of them has said it yet, but they were together, in a very real and very romantic way.   
“What is it, Lena?” she asks.   
Lena taps her thumb against the glass of the photo frame and says, “Well, are you this Kara? Or did you replace her?”   
It’s like Lillian always says, question everything. And this time, Lena does shift comfortably into that slightly detached scientific tone, laying out the foundations of a hypothesis.   
“I know the situation is slightly different with me. But just like everyone else I died when the anti-matter wave hit,” she says. She doesn’t miss the pained look on Kara’s face at the blithe way she talks about having died, and takes a moment to squeeze Kara’s hand. When Kara moves her other hand to rest on top of it, Lena’s heart flutters and she has to shift quickly back into her explanation to avoid the warmth coursing through her body. She explains the episodes with a clinical finesse, ghosting over her fear and panic with a smooth veneer of subjectivity.   
“With the Universe restored, certain aspects appear to have been rearranged or even overwritten.”   
She catalogues her evidence, including that her mother is now a pastel-pink wearing director of a humanitarian organisation, that Lex has been written in as the person who helped Supergirl defeat Agent Liberty, and of course, that Lena is no longer the CEO of L Corp. “It’s like I’ve been rewritten to not only always be at Lex’s side, but to be in his shadow,” she says. “But I remember what was taken from me. I remember –” Lena gets so caught up in putting the pieces together that when Kara pulls her into a tight hug it takes her completely by surprise. It takes a moment for her arms to find their way around Kara’s waist, but once they’re there it feels like home.   
“I remember all the good you did, how you saved billions of lives,” breathes Kara. “How you saved me.”  
Lena pulls back but Kara doesn’t let her go too far, leaving their lips hovering less than an inch apart. Her eyes are downcast when she says, “And you must also remember that I stole Myriad from the Fortress of Solitude. And that I’d created a way to intercept the minds of every person on the planet to…” in place of the words that are meant to follow there is only the stuttering breath she draws. Lena had meant it all for the greater good but now she isn’t sure what that means. Lex himself had admitted that death had changed him. _Success isn’t worth much if you don’t have anyone to share it with._ Lena can’t say for certain that she still believes in Non Nocere.   
A gentle touch of Kara’s forehead to hers lets her know she’s been silent too long.   
“This is a lot,” says Kara, and Lena feels the empathy in her words. There’s no admonishment or incredulity, just a gentle reassurance that makes Lena feel human.   
“And I haven’t even answered your other questions,” says Lena.   
“There’ll be time for that.”   
“How do you do that, so effortlessly?” asks Lena. She’s gripping Kara’s wrist which is now holding her face in her hand. “I’m not sure I deserve it.”  
“Hope, help, and compassion for all,” cites Kara. It has the desired effect of unleashing an almost undignified chortle from both of them, cutting the tension as Lena collapses into the seatback of the couch.   
“You do realize that you were the one who wrote that line,” says Lena.  
Kara groans in response. “Maybe you don’t have to fill in all of the gaps?”

It would be so easy for Lena to dissolve into this moment, to let her body fold into Kara’s arms like she knows it needs to, like so many other nights. Her body is leaden, but her mind is still busy amalgamating all the information into something coherent; something more than just feelings and memories.   
Kara, on the other hand, is trying very hard to sit still. Lena can practically feel her nervous energy vibrating through the couch cushions. She tries to structure a way to break the silence that has settled between them, but her own sudden nervousness only makes her overthink.   
“No clocks,” says Kara. Her inquisitive nature never turns off, and Lena clutches at the casual ice breaker.   
“No clocks,” she affirms, “It’s a rule.”   
“A rule?” asks Kara. “Are there… a lot?”  
Lena swivels in her seat so she can tuck one leg underneath her, and watches Kara pull her feet off the floor, bringing her knees closer to her chest.  
Lena is about to point out that Kara has sweatpants and fuzzy socks in the chest of drawers in the bedroom, but her cheeks grow warm at the implication. She did ask Kara to stay. And Kara agreed to stay. She wants Kara to be comfortable, and while the slacks seem to be loose enough, she still looks overdressed for their current situation.   
“I don’t know anything about this place,” says Kara. There’s a sense of playfulness in the way she says it, and Lena can hear her asking to be let in.   
“Right, sorry,” says Lena, leaving her previous train of thought to idle. And with the blush still warm on her skin she begins to outline the rules and point out as many features as she can without having to leave the couch.

The rules, as she had put it, range from guidelines to deal breakers. Deal breakers are enforced, like no wearing the Super-suit indoors, and for Lena, no bringing any work home. When Kara rolls her eyes at what she perceives to be a lax rule, Lena relays a story about a standoff between herself and the computer system when she had unwittingly walked in wearing a watch prototype for the DEO. By the end of the story Kara is red-faced from laughing at the thought of Lena being held hostage by her own genius. It’s a sophisticated system, artful and complex, but as Lena puts it, anything is possible for a Luthor.   
Guidelines have workarounds, emphasis on the work. To demonstrate, Lena fishes her phone from under the folds of her cardigan. The screen displays an erratic montage of symbols and numbers. There’s a block on all incoming and outgoing communication signals, everything from radio waves to cellular. It can be decrypted, but the system logs all breaches, and it’s time consuming. Time better spent with each other.   
“I guess just telling you to turn it off wouldn’t really work,” laughs Kara.   
“It needed to be more… concrete than that,” says Lena. “This place is like… our Camp David.”

The two-storey house is designed for comfort and escape for each of them. Kara Zor-El has the Fortress of Solitude, and Lena Luthor has her lab, but this place serves as neutral territory – it belongs to both of them. Lena watches Kara scan the room as she identifies markers that resonate for her. Her eyes land first on the rug that blends their two styles together perfectly, then the paperback fiction books with their curling edges from countless re-readings, and the knitted throw draping the armchair near the corner window that overlooks the garden. Lena lets her soak it all in, wondering what she’s thinking.   
“Am I your –“ Kara blurts suddenly, and it’s not that she stumbles so much as is caught by surprise at hearing the words form out loud.  
“Are we… married?” Kara corrects. Lena smiles at the way she handles the word, as if it’s a newborn kitten. She hums around the answer, darting around the flurry of feelings and memories that want to escape from her mouth.   
“No,” she says. It’s a strain to say nothing further.   
“Just together,” Kara says, nodding her head thoughtfully.   
Lena is relieved at the simple acceptance, before remembering Kara’s earlier declaration of love. A declaration that she has yet to respond to.   
“I’m dating Lena Kieran Luthor.” Kara’s smile lights up her face like the tail of a comet streaking through space.   
Lena exhales the breath she’d been holding as Kara’s reaction chases effervescent bubbles up her spine. Every hair stands on end, and to Kara’s credit she registers the change in Lena’s heartbeat like a seismic tilt to the world.   
“You’re not happy about this?” Kara hedges.   
“No, God, it’s not that at all,” Lena says. She fidgets with the folds of her cardigan, just to have something to do with her hands that isn’t knitting her fingers in Kara’s soft hair and bringing their faces together so she can map her buoyant smile with the brush of her lips. It doesn’t help that Kara is pleading with her to open up again with huge, blue eyes and internally, Lena straddles the jagged edges between two histories.  
“Before Lex told me you were Supergirl I had very complicated feelings about you,” says Lena.

Kara ripples at the mention of his name and Lena knows she is trying to reign in a burst of energy surging behind her eyes. She reaches out for Kara’s forearm and lets her hand rest there in familiar routine. Kara seals the heat away behind tight eyelids, taking a moment to arrange her face so it resembles a calm marble statue. Lena then slides her hand down Kara’s arm until her thumb finds the pulse point on the inside of her wrist. In practiced fashion she traces clockwise circles on her skin until Kara seems to find a rhythm of ease within herself again, the marble expression dropping from her face. Lena files away a mental note as Kara curiously interlocks their fingers, relaxing further when Lena doesn’t pull her hand away.   
“How did you do that?” she asks quietly.   
“It’s just something… I’d learned,” Lena admits freely, losing focus to the tentative touch of Kara’s fingers on her skin. “I wasn’t sure if it would work on you.” Green eyes are trained on the delicate movement of Kara’s fingers, memorizing the sensation of the lift and pull of Kara’s hand as it gauges the weight of Lena’s hand in her own. It feels almost like a test of synchronism. Time stands still and the only thing of consequence is what they are doing in this very moment.

\---------

Kara knows a thing or two about complicated feelings. She’s utterly absorbed in holding Lena’s hand. Something she’d never taken the time to really contemplate before, but now that she knows exactly how their hands and fingers fit together it’s hard to imagine ever letting go. Everything is complicated except this – this small, unifying act of holding Lena’s hand. Had their love really been so complicated that it needed rules? The more she thinks about it, the more she comes to realize that the rules had been created by both of them, to serve each other and protect each other from their unique set of circumstances. From what she can see they were really happy together. Lena seems to know her even better now, which would unsettle her if it wasn’t well, Lena. She wonders what this Kara had to sacrifice in order to get here with Lena, and then she wonders what she’ll have to sacrifice in order to get it back and keep it. It feels as though her brain is performing Cirque du Soleil acrobatics in trying to decipher if she has ripped one Kara out of a happy existence, or if these memories have been partitioned from her somehow, or if some other complicated timeline related phenomenon has occurred. Honestly, she doesn’t know how Barry deals with this kind of thing so regularly. All she wants to do right now is ignore everything that isn’t holding Lena’s hand and making the anguish disappear from her green eyes. If there was a singular action, a sweeping gesture, anything that would accomplish that task she would do it at the speed of sound. But that’s a selfish thought. It reminds her of a conversation she’d once had with Mon-el. The feeling that cascades into the pit of her stomach is unwanted.   
_Being a hero and falling in love, those are not easy things. They’re hard, and they’re messy, and they hurt sometimes._

The sensation of Lena’s hand is warm but heavier now, and Kara can already tell from the even spacing between breaths that she is drifting off to sleep. She gazes at Lena’s soft expression, admiring the length of her eyelashes, lighter than usual without the film of mascara she usually adorns. She’s trying to find the right name for the shade of her natural lips when Lena’s sleepy voice interrupts her with, “I can feel you staring at me.”  
“It’s very hard not to stare at you,” says Kara with a shrug.   
“Are you… flirting with me?” Lena says. She’s trying to put a touch of scandal into her voice but they both know she’s too tired to do it any justice.   
“No, but I am taking you to bed,” says Kara. Lena laughs quietly and Kara is too taken by the sound to bother correcting her poorly phrased change of subject. She hasn’t heard Lena’s genuine laugh in so long that for a moment she just joins in with her, hoping to sustain it a little longer.   
“I’ll take the guestroom,” she says, just so that her intentions are understood.   
Lena’s laugh tapers off and she sits up, a look of careful consideration on her face. It makes Kara nervous about what she’s about to say, hoping that she hasn’t crossed a line and risked banishment.   
“There is no guestroom,” says Lena. “We don’t exactly have guests over.”   
It’s surprising only because the house itself seems so expansive, but Kara also feels a sense of freedom in that it really is something for just the two of them.   
“Fine, the couch then,” she smiles, making a show of stretching her arms out behind her, leaning slightly backwards because it really is very comfortable.  
Lena shakes her head. And when she stands and extends a hand towards Kara, there’s a silent agreement between the two of them to just see the night through.

There’s an intoxicating intimacy in being loosely led by Lena’s hand. Up the stairs and along the hallway, like they’ve done this a million times, until they are in the bedroom. Lena points out the door to the ensuite as well as the door to the walk-in closet, mentioning that Kara’s comfy clothes are in the dresser drawers on the left. While Lena is climbing into her side of the bed, Kara whooshes into the first two items she finds – grey sweatpants and a soft cropped t-shirt that hangs loosely off her shoulders – before Lena has a chance to tell her ‘no powers in the house’, in case it’s a rule. When no such pronouncement comes she carefully peels back the sheets on her side of the bed and climbs in beside Lena. She’s enveloped suddenly by the bouquet of Lena’s perfume, warm and close, on the pillows and sheets caressing her exposed skin. Her body is rigid, ram-rod straight, one palm flat against the mattress, her pinkie dangerously edging the dip in the surface that denotes the proximity of Lena’s body. Kara forces her focus onto the ceiling above her, trying to stop her senses from overloading her brain. It’s a small comfort to realize that Lena’s heart is beating just as loudly and fiercely in her chest as Kara’s is in hers. Her emotions are swimming in the dark with her, unsure if silence or reaching out is the right thing to do, the thing that will calm them both.   
“Kara?”   
“Yeah?” she says, but even the single syllable snags on her nerves.   
“There are two buttons on the side of the bed base, can you feel them?” asks Lena.  
Kara runs her hand along the wooden base and finds the small rectangular buttons in line with her shoulder.   
“Press the first one,” says Lena. There’s an infinitesimal hesitation on Kara’s part. “Don’t worry,” says Lena. “It’ll help.”   
Kara pushes the button. Above her, two panels in the high ceiling slowly retract, allowing Kara to see a patch of night sky with a spattering of stars.   
“So you don’t feel so claustrophobic,” Lena mumbles mostly into her pillow. Kara takes a deep breath in, almost inhaling the sky with it as her body’s tension eases. She’s always struggled to sleep in new and unfamiliar places, but she knows that this isn’t the only reason for her current anxiety. Still, Lena is right, it does help.   
“Other one projects,” whispers Lena. Kara really should just let her fall asleep, but she’s curious now, and it’s obvious that Lena is trying to make her as comfortable as possible. She pushes the other button and silently, the skylight panels slide back into place and out of the darkness the ceiling transforms into a projection of outer space, like a beautiful, moving piece of art. Kara actually squeals with delight when she recognizes the Keyhole Nebula. The dusty-pink clouds swirl around in the darkness, reminding her of pale sweeps of cotton-candy that Kara reaches out to touch with awestruck fingertips.   
“Sometimes you just like to feel closer to space,” says Lena. Kara’s super-hearing is the greatest gift in that moment, because the explanation rushes out in more breath than voice, but it fills Kara’s heart. And suddenly space isn’t the only thing that she wants to feel closer to. She asks one last question before she has time to lose her nerve.   
“Lena?” she whispers. “Can I hold you?”   
This time Lena’s reply is completely unintelligible with sleepiness. Kara doesn’t push. She lets her mind quiet, content with the stars above her and Lena by her side. That is until Lena crawls into her arms, tucking the crown of her head just below Kara’s chin, her cheek resting against her chest and her body moulding to Kara’s side. Kara swallows thickly as she curls her arm around Lena, securing her against her ribcage.  
She decides in that instant that she will do whatever it takes to keep this.


End file.
